Even smart people can make dumb mistakes when they are looking for low-priced designers. When businesses, especially SMB (Small & Medium sized business) look for web designers to work on their website, either to give it a new look or to update it with mobile friendliness, they start with an RPF (Request for Proposal). The RPF is sent to several agencies to give their feedback about the same and more importantly about the pricing. It is important to note here that web designing is a market that follows perfect competition. There are several buyers (every business is looking to upgrade to responsive platform) and several service providers. The tuff competition among service providers has kept the pricing in an affordable range. Still many clients would be in search of the cheapest options. Here’s how this can hurt:

1. Looking for a short cut

Low-cost web designers come in two types. The first kind can be called ‘Template Grabbers’, who would grab templates from several web platforms selling them and pass them off as their own designs. Indeed, the output looks professionals but be sure that you would be using a template that some other business would be paying for. The second type is the ‘Pretty Makers’, who are skilled in using pictures from the web to create pretty graphics on your pages. They are indeed better than the first kind but they still overlook copyrights and use pictures that make your pages heavy and experience long loading time. According to recent statistics, more than 85% of images used online are subject to copyright infringement. You might not be the thief but your designer is. Most of these pictures are grabbed from stock photo/photography websites like Getty Images, photography forums like Flicker and some even from Facebook!

So, hiring substandard web designs might cost you more than you would have imagined!

2. Misunderstanding the ethos of your business

Inferior and in-experienced web designers will always want to balance their lack of website designing knowledge with pretty graphics. However, graphics is a small part in the overall design process. The main aim of your website should be about being able to connect with customers and integrate functionalities that enhance the efficiency of the process. Further, web design should also support the overall content of the website.

In 2011, websites influenced $1.1 trillion in retail sales. At the same time, if a website takes more than 4 seconds to loads, the bounce rate (people leaving the site) goes up to 100%. So designs aren’t just meant to look pretty but also serve other vitals of survival. You wouldn’t get this with a startup designer.

3. Charging in blatantly

No wise warrior runs into the battlefield without proper planning. Experienced web designers will take time in understanding a brand and researching about the competition it faces in the market. These would be the key in coming up with a website design that gives a competitive advantage to the client.

4. Meeting customer needs

48% of ecommerce customers believe that if a business website isn’t working well on mobile, it’s an indication that the business/brand is simply not caring. Customers simply choose to move away. By the year 2020, 85% of customers will be using mobile devices to manage their relationships with brands. Consequently, brands too need to integrate their demands into their websites. A low-cost website designer simply doesn’t qualify for the job.

5. No room for creativity

Finally, website design is viewed as an important low-cost to create a unique brand identity. It will be the face of your business/brand for a long time, probably for always. Shoddy web designers working with rigid templates leave no room for creativity or make your website interactive.

Even if it costs a bit more, investing in a brand identity consultant always pays off better. The world is going responsive and you shouldn’t be in the last batch to follow.